


when you kiss me, I'm happy enough

by magisterequitum



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire
Genre: F/M, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-29
Updated: 2011-07-29
Packaged: 2017-10-21 22:07:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/230382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magisterequitum/pseuds/magisterequitum
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Banished by Queen Daenerys, Jaime is set with the task of returning Sansa Stark to Winterfell, fulfilling his promise made years ago. Spoilers for A Feast for Crows and minor A Dance with Dragons.</p>
            </blockquote>





	when you kiss me, I'm happy enough

The Queen summons him at mid-morning. The message is phrased as a request, flattery and nicety in ‘come join me’, but it’s a summons nonetheless. One does not refuse the ruler of the Seven Kingdoms. He’s not pleased, having been intercepted on the way to the practice yard. He’s given leave to at least go there from his room, using the yard to further his sword skills; he’s gotten better with the left hand, though there is always room for improvement. He changes course, thinks of switching his sword practicing clothes to something finer, then changes his mind again. She can receive him as is.

Queen Daenerys, the first of her name to rule, is in the throne room. Although she looks small on the Iron Throne, the great monstrosity appears as if it had been made for her in mind; and as a Targaryen, hadn’t it? She looks relieved to see his figure in the back of the hall. Her council stands around her, and she excuses herself from them.

“Ser Jaime,” she hails, and makes her way to him. She threads her hand through his left arm and steers them out of the room. “It’s not even lunch, and I’m already done with them,” she confides.

This queen is a curious one, Jaime thinks, with her tongue so willing to talk about whatever is on her mind. It’s because she has nothing to fear. He’s heard her say that dragons have nothing to be afraid of. The Seven Kingdoms are weary of fighting, and for the first time in many years the Iron Throne is hers in a way it hasn’t belonged to any of the others before her.

They walk along the ramparts, and below, the sounds of the rebuilding of the city reach here too.

“I imagine them to be tiring. All clamoring for your affection,” he drawls. Jaime has never been suited for playing the lord. His talents and skill have always been the battlefield.

She stops, leaning against the stone ledge. Her laugh matches the ringing of the silver bells in her hair. “Yes, I suppose so.”

Jaime waits for her to speak. He has been summoned. He’s the one who is an esteemed guest of the Queen’s.

Finally, she turns to look at him, violet gaze serious. Sometimes he looks at her and feels flames on his skin. “I cannot keep you here,” she begins, hair moving with the wind. “The people have no love for you or your name.”

He flexes the fingers of his good hand and looks away from those eyes. “Ahh. Finally decided to have me done, my Queen?” His sword arm may have improved but not his tongue. He is a guest, but one held at her commands; a hostage is the more appropriate term.

She does not rise to his taunts. Instead, “Your brother speaks in your favor.”

“Tyrion, my beloved brother. What does he say as your Hand?”

“He speaks highly of you. And your transgressions against my family,” here she pauses and her gaze is unflinching. “I have forgiven. Not all have forgiven though. I cannot keep you here. You cannot stay.”

Breaking again from those eyes, Jaime looks out at King’s Landing. “Then what would you have of me?”

“Brienne tells me you once made a promise to Catelyn Stark to deliver her daughters to safety.”

Brienne, he thinks with almost fondness on his tongue; if he was capable of fondness anymore after the death of Cersei and the children. The wench had advanced herself to the Queensguard, trading rainbow for white. “The wench has a loose tongue.”

There is a hint of a smile at the corner of her lips as she leans further on the ledge. “As do you, ser. I grow weary of dealing with traitors and the like. Eddard Stark is dead. I will not punish his children for his deeds. Sansa Stark is returning to King’s Landing.”

That captures his interest. “Oh? Where has the Lady Stark been?”

“In the Vale. Petyr Baelish has had her there for some time. He’s dead now. I am giving her Winterfell.”

Jaime inclines his head. “Why?”

“It’s hers,” the young Queen pushes back from the ledge and angles her body more towards him. “And she deserves it. She gave me her aid when I first landed here in return for a promise.”

Off in the distance, one of her dragons circles lazily in the sky. From the darkness of the scales it’s probably the black one, terrifying like its ancestor. Sansa Stark as the Lady of Winterfell, keeper and Warden of the North. It is not an unattractive move. It would certainly settle the unrest there and bind the lands and holdings to the new Queen. The last he had seen of the girl she had been just that, a girl. He wonders what her price had been for this new ruler.

If the Queen sees her dragon she does not pay it any mind. “I would ask you to return her to Winterfell. You may fulfill your promise. And perhaps,” here she looks as if she understands far more than what she should given her time spent here. No doubt due to his brother and Selmy and the Dornish who have filled her in on all that she’s missed since her flight from Westeros as a child. “Find something else for yourself.”

“And should I not?”

Daeneyrs is serious as she turns to him. “Westeros is tired of fighting. I am tired of fighting. I want peace as does everyone else. Returning Sansa Stark to Winterfell will put to rest the North. I need her there.” She suddenly smiles, tight at the corners of her mouth. “Go elsewhere if you desire after, but you cannot return here.”

Banishment, is this queen’s decree. Jaime remembers a long time ago when he had said Sansa Stark was his last chance for honor. He had given up on the girl as lost. But now, it dangles before him again. And there is nothing that remains here for him in the city. “As my Queen commands.”

 

 

-

 

 

That evening Jaime eats dinner with his brother. The Queen’s Hand’s apartments are lavish, dark furnishings and windows thrown open to let in the warm air now that winter is gone. Their dinner is sparse, only two courses instead of the usual many. Food is no longer a scarcity, but neither of them feels the need to eat for hours. The fowl is well seasoned, hot spices imported from Dorne the cities beyond the sea, one of the latest fashions brought to Westeros by the queen and her followers.

“Your lady wife is coming,” Jaime says, taking care that the golden hand doesn’t get caught on the wine stem; he’s getting better at that. A proud achievement if there ever is one for him to have these days.

“She won’t be for much longer.”

“No?”

“I mean to set our farce of a wedding aside.” At the look Jaime gives him, he replies, “It was never consummated.”

“Oh really?” He lifts the wine glass to rid the taste of the peppers from his mouth. “Never bedded our Lady Stark?”

Tyrion’s mouth twists, and when he did it made the gash across his face even more terrible. “I’m not in the habit of bedding frightened girls.”

Once he would have replied with ‘only whores’, and they would have laughed. He has no taste for the wine now and returns it to the table. There’s nothing to say to that, and Jaime turns the conversation. “It was your idea then?”

“Putting Sansa Stark back in Winterfell? Mine and the Queen’s promise. The North is a mess, the Boltons and Stannis saw to that,” he pauses. “What are their words again?”

“A Stark must always be in Winterfell.” The words return to Jaime’s mind without needing prompting from his brother. He remembers when first Eddard Stark had told them to Robert as a beg off to remaining in the city to help him settle affairs after the war.

Tyrion nods. “Sansa Stark will bind the North and sew up its wounds. And I imagine,” there is something in his mismatched eyes. “That she has lost her love for the South. It’s a small mercy to let the girl go home after all she has been through.”

They fall silent after that and finish eating. Their conversations should have been filled with sly jokes and laughter. That had been many years ago, and now Jaime’s content that he’s not dead.

Before he leaves though, Tyrion says one more thing.

“And brother,” he calls as Jaime is making to leave through the door. He turns to look at the Queen’s Hand. “Do be careful. You’ll find this Sansa Stark much different from the little girl she used to be. That is if she doesn’t have you killed first.”

 

 

-

 

 

The girl arrives the following week. He sees her first at the feast that evening. It’s a small one of no more than a few hundred of Daenerys’ court: Dothraki horselords and their rowdy voices, Dornish men with their colorful clothing, and many more from the lands across the seas, as well as her chosen favorites here in the Seven Kingdoms.

But girl no more is Sansa Stark. The small wisp of a maid at three-and-ten is long gone. Now a woman of nearly eight-and-ten sits at the right of the Queen and King. Daenerys wears her House colors tonight, red silk of the new style with black stones at her throat and wrists. The King, once a bastard son and the Commander of the Wall, matches her.

The woman next to them sits in direct contrast. Sansa doesn’t wear the latest Southron fashions. She’s not adorned in close fitting silk or the braids that the Queen and her Dothraki have made popular. Instead, he notes from where he sits at the back of the hall, her gown is of thick blue material and her auburn hair hangs freely over her shoulders and around her face. Tully colors and the look of her mother, though even he cannot deny that she’s more beautiful than the late Catelyn Stark.

Jaime watches his new charge to take north. She speaks little and the corners of her mouth never once pull up into a true smile. Sad, he thinks, and he cannot fault her. Innocence and happiness had been stolen from her the moment they cut off her father’s head.

He leaves her be that night. His presence will not bring her any comfort, and he finds his concerns affirmed when he see her the next day. He’s in the training yard with the King. It’s the only place where the former Jon Snow and he get along, being that they are too engaged in trying to beat the other black and blue.

They’re just finished when the Lady Stark appears. She stands at the wooden fence.

He cannot help but call out, “It grieves me to no longer call you family, Lady Sansa.” He’d known about her visit to the septons this morning with his brother.

Where before the young maid wouldn’t have dared to look him in the eye with her answer, the woman does. “I cannot say the same, ser.”

Jaime frowns and hands his sword to the young boy beside him. He’s somewhat delighted to find someone who talks back at him. Tyrion used to, but not anymore. “You wound me, my lady. And here I am promising to return you home.”

Her voice is no louder than normal, but her words are hard. “I learned a long time ago not to believe in promises from lions.”

“That’s enough, Lannister.” The King’s voice cuts him off from replying. He takes his once sister’s arm and leads her away, a cold look in his grey eyes.

He watches them leave and gestures to the young boy. “My sword.” He can at least hack the cloth dummies.

 

 

-

 

 

The day they leave the skies overhead are cloudy and grey. There is no loud crowd to watch them leave the city. Not like how he once rode out for battle.

Jaime makes his way to the stables, intent on seeing to the saddling of his horses. The King hadn’t given in on Jaime’s request to have his own men escorting them to Winterfell. The new King had wanted to do it himself, but had been reminded by the Queen and council his place was in King’s Landing. When he couldn’t have his wish, he’d insisted on some non-Lannister men making up the escort. There had been no protesting it.

Sansa stands near the bridled and saddled Glory. She pets the palfrey, scratching lightly on its face and above the nose as Piper chatters away next to her. They have no wagon in their group, only two pack horses with some supplies. The rolled up letter in his saddlebag affixed with the seal of a three headed dragon will be enough to see them lodged at any inn or village along the way.

Coming to stand next to her, Jaime can feel her tense and her hands still. “You’re early, Lady Stark.”

“I’ve made my goodbyes already,” she replies. “And I want to go home.”

Yes, he can see that despite the blank face she seems so fond of showing.

She resumes her petting of his horse, fingers encased in worn leather. They will make a sight on the Kingsroad with his dented armor and her threadbare and old clothing.

He touches the horse himself. The girl, woman really because she’s nothing but with that height and body, utters what could be a snort. “Would you like to ride her?”

Sansa turns her head sharply and stares at him. He doesn’t know why he offers, except that it’s a long way to Winterfell and riding with a sullen and angry woman is not high on his list of fun outings, and that his family has done so much to her that this seems to be a kindness he can give. “Your mount from the Vale is still weary. Glory will see you well on the road.”

She nods after a moment and accepts the help of Pip, no longer so little either, up into the saddle.

There is not much after that to do. There’s no one for him to say goodbye to, and if Sansa is done with hers, and they have everyone and everything else then it’s no use in delaying. They set out, the thirty of them all together; there’s not enough men to spare, though her once brother has promised her men and aid in the future he’d overheard.

The clouds are thick and their farewell is the sound of their horses’ hooves as they make their way down the hill and toward the gates of the city.

 

 

-

 

 

The ride up the Kingsroad is slow going and long. Many leagues lie between the South and the North of Winterfell. And it turns out that Jaime is indeed saddled with a sullen and quiet woman. She rides without speaking unless spoken to, her face perfectly composed in a blank stare. The other men are not entertaining enough for him. He finds himself wanting to hear her talk, or shout, or scream, or anything else so long as it’s noise of some kind.

He thinks her at first to be so beaten by what’s been thrown at her over the years that she’s broken. But then Tyrion’s words come back to him. There is something wrong, and he seldom lets things just be. He’s changed, but not that much. He resolves to get her to talk if only so their trip won’t be so silent.

Sansa rides Glory next to his squire, and her face turns to him from where she has been looking out at the forest when he moves up next to her. He passes a skin of water to her. “My brother says you made the Queen promise you something.” This is how their conversations start because there exists no niceties between them that would allow anything but just jumping into it.

She sips and hands the skin back. “She needed the Vale and its backing.”

“And its knights?”

Nodding, she agrees, “And the knights. I promised her them in return for justice for my family.”

“The Frey’s?” There are songs about the Red Wedding now, nearly as sorrow inducing as the Rains of Castamere.

“Frey’s, Boltons, the Greyjoys--” Her voice fades off, and the look in her eye seems to say ‘you too’.

Jaime says nothing, and Sansa turns back to look at the trees. “Justice in fire and blood. It was an easy decision.”

 

 

-

 

 

Two days later, and they’ve stopped for a break beside a creek. He’s impressed with how well she hasn’t complained along the way, remembering that Cersei used to complain how uncomfortable travelling was. That is enough to turn his mood. He quickly dismisses that line of thought.

Jaime walks to where Sansa sits and pulls her up with his left arm. “Come.”

She digs the heels of her boots into the ground, stares at him, but is cut off before she can speak.

“You should stretch your legs out when we stop or else the next time we stop you won’t be able to walk,” he tells her.

There’s no fault in his words for her to find, and she lets him lead her around the fellow men of their party. He notices that she’s grown at ease with them.

“Your husband,” he begins. “Harry?”

“He wasn’t my husband.”

“No?”

“I was married to your brother. Littlefinger tried to pass me as something I was not.”

“Two husbands, you’re a lucky woman, Lady Stark.” It’s mean to be mocking, as is the grin he gives her.

She looks as if she’s on the edge of smiling, but turns her head away. “Harry’s dead. I wouldn’t call that luck.”

“And Littlefinger too.” Jaime looks for a reaction, certain that his guess about the sly mockingbird’s death is true.

Sansa nods. “He taught me enough of the game before.”

“Did he?” He’s led them twice around their group now, and they come to a stop.

“I’m alive.” The ‘and he’s not’ hangs in the air between them.

He smiles at her, understanding Tyrion’s words of warning.

Removing her arm from his but not turning away, she says, “They both tried to make me something I was not.”

Jaime looks into her blue eyes, so serious and clear. Quietly, he asks, “And what you are you now?”

He gets a smile this time, a brief pull at the corners of her mouth. “Now, ser, now I am free.”

 

 

-

 

 

It’s when they get past where the still broken ruins of Harrenhal and then The Twins that they have their biggest breakthrough conversation. They’re both in foul moods when they stop at the inn, some small place with a badly painted dog on the hanging sign above the door. The Freys may be gone, eliminated after Queen Daenerys’ legendary march to the Wall, but his charge doesn’t seem to remember that. She’s been quiet and snappy since they passed over into this area.

And Jaime, Jaime is many things. He’s tired. Tired of being stuck with a woman who changes between seeming to tolerate him to pretending he’s not even there, tired of being banished and adrift when once his name would have struck fear into all, tired of the dreams where his sister is still alive, just tired. This is new to him. He doesn’t like it; things were simpler once when he only worried about the sword in his hand and the dead before him.

Sansa sits in the back of the dining room, at a table with his squire and the non-Lannister men at the table nearest to them. He’s pleased that when he approaches his look still sends Piper scurrying. He knows the look in the boy’s eye when he stares at the Lady Stark. Only the blind would say she isn’t beautiful.

“You didn’t have to chase him off,” she says to him when he takes the seat across from her.

“He shouldn’t look at you like that.”

“Why? Because you say so?”

“Because you are the Lady of Winterfell and he’s a squire. It’s indecent and only serving to hurt the poor sod making him fall in love with you and follow you around like some green boy.” The wine is sour and it loosens his tongue enough for the next part, “You are not so foolish as to not know that. Unless that is how you won the Vale for our Queen?”

Her face flushes, and he delights in the color on her pale cheeks. He continues, “Is that how you made your husband give his knights to you?”

Sansa’s fingers clench tight on the table top, so tight he can see the tiny bones. “Harry died. The knights were mine.”

“Oh yes, I forgot,” he grins, mocking and harsh. “And Littlefinger too. Did you kill them yourself or have someone else do it for you?”

Those blue eyes glare at him now, and her voice is as cold as her home and the grey and white of her travel dress. “I did what I had to. To survive. To live. I will not apologize for it. He taught me to play the game. It’s not my fault if I won.”

He laughs at that, and it’s not the answer she wants because next,

“Don’t you judge me. Don’t you dare. After what you did,” a triumphant look comes over her face, “Stabbing your king in the back. Kingslayer.” The taunt drips off her tongue.

Jaime, his name is Jaime, and no one seems to remember that. The sour wine, no Arbor for certain, has only furthered his mood. The inn is full and no one is paying them any attention except for the men seated at the table nearest to them occasionally looking their way.

He leans across the table, the gold hand thumping on the wood. His voice is a hiss as he speaks, “And you know why I did? You know the stories. You like stories, don’t you, my lady? Aerys was the Mad King. You know how our new queen likes her dragons and their fire? Aerys liked fire too. He burned his enemies alive. He would have set the entire city on fire too if not for me. But no one remembers that do they?”

She says nothing. The tension in her face that was aimed at him just moments ago has gone slack, eyes wide and mouth parted.

‘Where are my songs? Where are my thanks?”

Jaime leaves her there at the table.

 

 

-

 

 

Sansa comes to him early the next morning, appearing in front of the door to his room.

The knock is quiet. Still, it’s enough to make his head ache. Too much wine, too much piss poor wine. He’s already dressed, and buckling his sword belt. “Enter,” he calls.

She’s still wearing her Stark colors this morning, but her hair she’s braided back. She looks so much like her mother. The promise he made comes back in full with her standing there. “Ser Jaime,” she says, “I wanted to apologize for my words last night.”

His head aches too much to deal with this. “There is nothing to apologize for, my lady. I should not have provoked you so.”

“But still, I had no right. Not with what you did. It’s not fair. People shouldn’t call you--”

Jaime turns to face her fully. “Call me what? Kingslayer? It’s what I am.”

“You did what you had to.” In the pre-morning light outside the window she looks as young as that girl she once had been.

His mouth twists into a grimace. “The stories don’t sing about those of us like you and me. The ones who did what they had to.”

“It’s not right,” she insists.

It’s true. It’s not. But things in life seldom are as the Seven all preached with their different faces.

She seems to remember that when he offers nothing else to her. They stand facing one another in the room, her fingers twisting in the skirts of her dress. If she’s uncomfortable with him alone that’s the only sign.

“I’m tired of fighting,” she says.

“My lady?”

Sansa shifts her weight, plucking away at the grey fabric. “I’m tired of the past. This is what I have. You are what I have. My brothers and sister are gone.”

Her parents are left out, but Jaime knows that she means them as well. Would that it was her family here, or even the King. But he is all she has been sent. He resolves to fulfill his promise and see her to Winterfell, and even maybe get a laugh from her along the way. Pretty women should laugh.

“We should go,” Jaime says because she will not want her words acknowledged to him beyond a nod.

There’s a smile she gives him, that same small movement up her lips upward. A true smile too, along with laughter, he resolves.

 

 

-

 

 

They make good progress from there on to Winterfell.

Jaime rides more now so in the middle of their group, having taken down his standard and exchanging it with the snarling face of the Stark direwolf; the white and grey stands out against the black and red three headed dragon. His squire and Sansa still talk, but now she is more cautious about her answers and tends more to ride Glory near him and Honor.

He gets a laugh from her when one day the whole group sings bawdy tavern songs. Songs about wenches and the men interested in them. She snorts at their loud voices, but he catches her humming along when they begin repeating the verses.

But he does get a laugh and a true smile when they cross the Kingsroad into the lands beyond White Harbor and the Barrowlands to the west. The skies turn cloudy and dark with the sun barely shining through. Snow, Jaime thinks, and not a league later there is snow falling onto them.

Though winter had fled from the South, here in the North snow is forever and always. The men pull their cloaks about them, hoods over their faces to keep the chill out.

Sansa does none of that. She pushes her hood back to free her skin and strips her gloves off. With outstretched hands, she reaches for the snow. Her face she turns up towards the sky and grins as the flakes melt against her bare skin.

“Home,” she says, “I’m home.”

 

 

-

 

 

It would be too much to hope that they make it to Winterfell without problems. Daenerys may sit the Iron Throne, but the North still lies in chaos. When she had marched to the Wall to deal with the threat of the Others, she had eliminated the Freys who stood in her way and the Boltons and their atrocities. Stannis hadn’t stood a chance against three dragons. But as quickly as the Queen had come North, she had left.

Now, she’d put Sansa Stark to the task of cleaning up the mess.

The Northern men find them in their inn for the night. Word of Eddard Stark’s daughter and her arrival home had reached every man, woman, child, and dog it seems. Raven or mouth, the news had traveled fast.

Jaime sits at a table, eating the inn cook’s dinner of what he’d said is beef stew. He personally would sooner believe rat or dog over a cow being in this watery soup. The men burst through the front door bringing in the cold air from outside with them. Left hand already moving to his sword hilt, he counts the sigils on the tunics. All Stark lords and lieges, from small holdings to bigger ones. Trouble his count says.

“Lannister,” the one in the front sneers. And ah, good, they hadn’t forgotten him.

“Your new Lady was hoping to see you at Winterfel, good sers, though she might be willing to see you now.” He has no intention of letting Sansa anywhere near them despite his words.

“You think you can pass us off another fake Stark?” That’s the one in front again.

There’s mutterings and curses from the rest of them. More men than their group and the inn keeper is edging away into the kitchens. Trouble it is. The fake Arya had been his brother’s idea and that had only failed in the end. He can understand their uneasiness to believe in the truth this time. The North had been burned one too many times.

“Sansa Stark has returned to take her father’s seat.” Jaime rises now from the bench, and thankfully the men, both Lannister and non, rise behind him.

Another man steps forward, old and grizzly with a green fawn on his chest. “And has you to escort her home, Kingslayer?”

He grins. “She likes me for my looks and good hands.” The golden hand is over the stump, and he waves it at them.

At those words, the Northern men draw their swords and steel. Jaime’s sword is already out before the men can step forward. He takes satisfaction in the ringing noise of metal on the scabbard. There’s been some time since he’s been in a fight, the feel of a sword heavy in his hand as he wields it and drives it into flesh before him.

Before either group can move, a voice yells out from the stairs. “Stop!”

Wary of one another, they all turn to face the figure now at the base of the steps. She’s wearing the heavy skirts of Stark colors and her auburn hair hangs down her back. She looks the part, and there’s no denying it after the words that leave her mouth next.

“Don’t move!” she snaps when one of her father’s lieges try and move again. “You once swore allegiance to my father. And some of you to my brother.” She pauses and takes a breath, and Jaime can see her fingers itch to pluck at the folds of her dress like earlier. She does it when she’s nervous, he’s come to realize. It’s oddly endearing.

Finally, she continues, “But they are both gone. I am Sansa Stark, returned to you now. I was born in the first snow of winter. Queen Daenerys has given it to me, but Winterfell is not something to be given. The Starks have held Winterfell for centuries, and there must always be one there.”

They are the right words to say, and despite being in the South for many years, Sansa remembers these Northern men. Their swords they put away, and go to their knees before her.

Jaime only puts his away when he is certain there is no longer an immediate threat. And if he makes sure that he’s by her side when she speaks with each of her new lieges and the like, and if she grips his arm tight so as not to show her trembling fingers, then neither of them comment on it.

 

 

-

 

 

Winterfell is in ruins would be the kindest thing to say when they arrive.

What they find is a mockery of what once was the great stone castle. The towers are gone, walls and fortifications missing, and snow has started to build up in places. The only saving point is that the main hall and part of the castle are not completely destroyed, someone or some group having tried to rebuild it.

Sansa walks the grounds, and then comes to him where he is ordering the men to make camp inside for the night. “I don’t know how to do this.”

“Do what?”

“Rebuild a castle. The town around it.”

Jaime tilts his head at her, failing to keep a grin from his face at her expression. He flourishes his arms to her. “And you think I can help you? I only have one good hand, my sweet.” He’s taken to calling her different endearments to get a reaction from her.

Today she only frowns. “Not build it yourself. But you’ve been in the field, in wars. You must know something about building walls and things.”

He laughs at her because what she says is silly and beyond wrong. But he does suppose she has a point. Sobering himself, he says, “You need builders. Woodcutters and carvers and stonemasons. You’ll have to find them from the villages and towns around. As for the people and the rest of Winterfell, they will come back when there is something to come back to.”

It’s a daunting task, especially with only herself and him and thirty men to start with. She doesn’t balk though, only nods. “Okay. Then that’s what we will do.”

And that is how they rebuild Winterfell. It’s slow. It takes months of building, of finding people from the villages and towns around the area willing to help, of setbacks and small victories, and throughout all of it Sansa is unflagging. She takes to her new role as Lady of Winterfell well, never going unseen and there to be a presence when the people grow weary.

 

 

-

 

 

One month turns into two and Jaime is still here.

He has taken on the role of protector for the Lady Stark and as overseer. The people don’t love him, they barely tolerate him but for the word of their Lady, but they come to him for answers to questions on the building and such. It amuses him and would be concerning if he allowed himself to think about it at an extent.

Tonight, the hall is empty of its mistress at dinner. He frowns at her absence and leaves, having an idea as to where she is. The godswood with its great weirwood had remained untouched; she likes visiting it, whether she prays or sits for comfort he does not know.

This is where Jaime finds her, skirts spread on the ground, head bowed, and the white bark glows in the dark. He thinks her to be praying at first, and would that she is when he hears the sobs and makes out the shakes of her body.

“My Lady?” He calls to her softly, not wanting to alarm her. She doesn’t respond, and he walks closer to her. “Sansa?”

Her name gets a reaction. She jerks her head up at him, her fingers trembling over her face. “This wasn’t supposed to be me. My father or mother... Or Robb,” she cries out.

Crying makes him uncomfortable. After his mother’s death Tywin had forbidden tears from Casterly Rock. The few times that Cersei had cried, because she would only cry in front of him, Jaime had comforted her with his body. He does not think that Sansa would appreciate that at the moment. She’s ducked her head back down to her drawn knees.

Jaime kneels to join her on the ground, thankful he’d remembered to wear his thickest breeches today as the ground is cold. Hesitating, he puts his good hand on her shoulder. She turns towards him, and he changes hands to have the gold one drawing her in and his left one slowly stroking her head. He offers noises of sympathy and tells her, “You’re doing fine.”

It’s a moment of weakness for her, and he’s surprised it only took this long for her to break. She’s been hiding her emotions, first for years before to survive, then on the road without help from her only know relative alive, and now here playing her role as the Lady of Winterfell.

He holds her till her sobs reside.

“I’ve forgotten how to pray,” she says.

“I forgot a long time ago. We make quite a pair, my lady.”

She smiles, and they sit side by side underneath the great weirwood.

 

 

-

 

 

The snow comes and goes. Jaime is not used to it, being born of the Rock and most of his life spent in the South. The Northerners delight in it, some seeing it as a sign of good favor from the old gods and others seeing it as a return to normalcy. He chooses to prowl the castle during these times.

Sansa’s in a room with the windows opened. She takes to the cold as if she never left. She’s bent over a long table and fabric when he joins her. Taking in the needles and strings, she’s sewing. There’s a pile of clothing next to her as well, and he sees what looks to be one of his crimson shirts.

“Mending my clothes, little dove?” Dove this afternoon because she wore a necklace with birds last evening in the hall. He leans his hip against the table where she’s seated.

“Your squire was making a mess of the embroidery. And I don’t quite know if I’m so little anymore,” she says, needle in her slim fingers and a sly look in her eyes.

No, not so little with her woman’s curves. The men have started to notice, and whispers of marriage proposals and courting were beginning to make their rounds. Jaime ignores that thought and looks at what she’s working on. Wall hangings, tapestries, and he remembers when Tyrion had been fascinated with finding the Targaryen ones hidden away after Robert’s ascension to the throne. The colors are vivid and the detail impressive. The faces are familiar, as are the scenes, and the wolves. No, direwolves.

“Your family,” he says quietly.

She’s remaking the history of Winterfell.

‘Yes, they should be remembered.”

He leaves her to them because he has no place in this.

 

-

 

When the castle is rebuilt and the homes are being built anew around it, the Lady Stark calls for her once father’s lieges to come swear to her. It’s symbolic, but necessary to settle the area.

Sansa sits tall in the seat that now belongs to her. The Stark banner rests on the wall behind her, and again she wears the colors of her House; though this dress, he notes, she’s made herself as he remembers seeing her stitch the vines along the collar.

Jaime stands to the right of her, hand on his sword as a reminder. She’d laughed at him and said everything would be fine, to which he’d laughed in response. Sometimes her naivety still clung to her. He can see the distaste and anger in their eyes. He knows what they whisper about him, that the lion’s been tamed by the wolf and now serves under her. There are others that whisper worse things, demeaning and such not to him but to her; he deals with those through his own men.

She sits as if unmoving, hands resting in her lap. Lady Stark of Winterfell, come to life. She listens to their complaints and their woes, but each and every one she gets their words of fealty and promise from.

Something like pride and delight hits him.

 

-

 

He thinks about leaving.

One time, a second time, and then many times. Sansa is fine here now. There’s no love here with these people for him, though some have started to accept him as a fixture they cannot shake. He thinks about leaving, but then where would he go? King’s Landing is forbidden. The Rock is Tyrion’s now. He has nothing, but this.

He stays for now.

 

-

 

The fact that Sansa Stark is unwed comes to head when they have their first real feast. The lands under Winterfell’s jurisdiction have been dealt with, and the people wish to celebrate the rebuilding. There’s game found in the Wolfswood, elk and deer. The cooks turn the meat into a worthy dinner, and there are even lemon cakes; the ingredients brought in with the latest supplies.

Lords and son lay claim to her when the dancing starts. Sansa laughs at first and accepts, but with each passing man Jaime can see her grow tired. Her blue eyes turn dull and her hair limp. He interrupts and takes her himself.

She brightens, and mouths ‘thank you’ as they turn around the cleared away floor. Her cheeks are flushed, from the wine no doubt. She halts their steps, and orders, “I find myself tired. Escort me to my rooms.”

They slip out of the hall, and he holds tight to her elbow on the stone steps. Her rooms are on the north end with wide windows for the cold air she likes so much, heated below like the old castle had been.

Sansa sighs when they reach them, leaning against the wall. Her eyes are bright once more, though whether it’s the wine or his company is debatable. “They all want me,” she says, then snorts, most unladylike. “No, they want my title and my lands.”

“They do.” It’s only natural that they would come sniffing around after some point and seeing that she really had raised Winterfell back from the ground.

“They annoy me,” pause and then quieter, “I don’t want any of them.”

“You still want your dream knight,” he says and she turns those eyes on him, blue and wounded.

“That’s cruel of you. I don’t believe in stories anymore. I believe in what’s real,” her voice invites no argument. “I have you,” she repeats what she said months ago in an inn.

“And what would you have of me, my lady?” he asks.

She seems frustrated with him, as if he’s not getting what she’s trying to tell him. In truth, he understands and wants too.

“I would have you.” There can be no confusion to her meaning when she steps forward into his space and body, hands rising to settle on his crimson tunic.

“Sansa,” he breathes out against her lips. He kisses her hard and their teeth clack as she puts her arms around his neck, pulling her body into his, pushing herself up tight against him.

“You, you, you,” she chants low when he grips her hair tight to expose her neck to his mouth. But it’s Sansa who pulls him into her room, Sansa who tugs his hair and face up to show him she wants him to pay attention to getting their clothes off, Sansa who strips the laces of her dress. It’s her lips and hands on his skin.

She’s long pale lines on dark furs when Jaime pushes her to fall onto the bed. Dark red hair unbound and tangled, white skin with a patch of freckles on one shoulder. She’s beautiful as she stares at him with dark blue eyes, and he hardens further at the sight of her.

Her hands are everywhere, his face and shoulders and chest, pulling him closer and down on top of her. He leans on his right arm so he can touch her with his left. Fingers at her breasts, down to her stomach, and then between her legs when she lets her thighs fall away.

“Did your husband touch you like this?” he asks, fingers working through red curls to find where she’s slick and wet and hot.

Sansa glares at him, her face changing from pleasure to annoyance. She raises her leg and kicks him lightly in the side. “I don’t want to talk about Harry.”

“As my lady commands.”

“I do.” Another tap to his side, and he catches it in his left to put it over his shoulder so he can add his mouth to his fingers.

Sansa comes with his name in her throat, the second syllable let go on an exhale. Her hands grab for him, pulling him back up her body. She kisses him, licks her way inside his mouth, not bothered with the taste of herself.

He pushes his cock inside her. His hips snap against her as he pushes in and then out and then in. He doesn’t take long to finish; not with her hands on him and the encouraging noises she’s making.

Jaime ducks his head to her neck, mouthing the sweaty skin. His breath comes in harsh pants.

“You,” she sighs and runs her fingers through his hair.

The furs will stick to their skin and become uncomfortable the longer they lay here, but Jaime finds himself unwilling to move or care.

 

-

 

They are in the godswood again.

She wears a cloak and dress, but underneath the wool lies the marks he put on her last night. He has his own under his clothes as well.

Sansa stands across from him, and despite the restlessness of her fingers she looks at him straight and her voice is firm, “You don’t have to stay here any longer. You kept your promise.”

Jaime says nothing because this is true. Catelyn Stark, Brienne, the Queen, all his promises had been fulfilled. Winterfell was rebuilt and whole once more, its Lady sitting inside. He can leave.

She steps forward. “But I would ask... I want you to stay.”

A choice. His to make for the first time in a long time. She had once said on the road that she was free now. He supposes he is too.

“I have grown fond of winter.”

The smile she gives him is the biggest yet.


End file.
